The mobile communication industry has experienced a period of exceptional growth during the last several years. New service enablers such as the Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS), Java, and the Extensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML) will continue to enable compelling new services for consumers and new sources of growth for the mobile industry. The development of these mobile services will continue to grow by using consumer behavior, the business structure surrounding the mobile service domains and technology.
To insure successful take-up of the evolving mobile services, however, the consumers must be able to discover them. Currently, mobile browsing is the predominant method used by the mobile service consumer to find such services. A typical browsing session generally starts when the user accesses the mobile network using a mobile browser. The user then submits a keyword of interest from the browser to a network search engine, which returns Web page descriptions and their corresponding Uniform Resource Locators (URL) that correspond to the keyword. By traversing the URLs supplied by the search engine, the user then discovers content that may or may not be of interest to him. In large part, therefore, only through the purposeful efforts of the user are services discovered. Furthermore, the success of service discovery depends largely on the choice of keyword that is exercised by the user and often results in irrelevant search results.
Generally speaking, in order for the user to produce fast and precise search results, an efficient search infrastructure concentrating on the content relevant to the user is needed. In addition, a simple user interface with ready made search templates is required to generate an effective keyword search. Additionally, the search infrastructure should take into account the user's profile and preferences, the user's mobility, the user's location, the device profile that the user is presumably using, and the time of the search.
The use of a Service Discovery Engine (SDE) is often utilized to aid the user in finding services on the Mobile Internet. The SDE provides the user with a single interface point that facilitates the user's interaction with the carrier and Web domain registries on the network. The SDE also maintains the session information of the user's interaction with it, any transaction and interaction histories, and the user's profile and preference server information. In that way, the SDE is able to personalize its interaction with the user, so that the user's success may be maximized.
Service discovery mechanisms continue to develop as consumer's interaction with the Mobile Internet matures. In addition, browser technology is being enhanced to support the developing service discovery mechanisms. Currently, however, the state of the art is deficient in enabling the user to discover services and content that is relevant to the user's current content consumption session, such as watching TV, listening to the radio, or other similar activities.
Further, the state of the art is deficient in automatically enabling cross-media advertisements to the users who are currently consuming content related to those cross-media advertisements. In such instances, services that are relevant to the user due to their similarity with the user's current Internet session are, therefore, being withheld from the user due to the deficiencies of the state of the art. Still further, the state of the art is deficient in enabling an independent channel to be used for those services.
Rudimentary cross-media solutions do exist in the prior art, for example, between Amplitude Modulation (AM)/Frequency Modulation (FM) radio stations and their corresponding Web sites. In particular, a user is able to listen to a particular FM broadcast, while obtaining information from the radio station's web site concerning: the current song playing, the identity of the disk jockey hosting the broadcast, etc. Additionally, Web radios exist today that provide media player solutions to enable user access to background information, while primary information, e.g., a radio broadcast, is being accessed. Such solutions, however, do not automatically open the secondary channel, while the primary channel is active. Rather, the user is required to purposefully open the secondary channel on his or her own initiative.
Accordingly, there is a need in the mobile communications industry for a system, method, and apparatus that facilitates an enhanced service discovery mechanism to rectify the deficiencies of the state of the art. In particular, cross-media communication should be enabled, so that the user may automatically receive secondary or auxiliary information that may be of interest to him or her, while the user is consuming primary content. Further, the cross-media communication channel should be automatically discovered and enabled at the user's option. Still further, the cross-media communication channel should be related to the primary content being consumed by the user, so that the user's interest in the secondary content may be maximized.